


Candy Apple Red

by jeleania



Category: Harry Potter - J. K. Rowling
Genre: ... or a lot, Fem!Harry, First Impressions, Gen, assumptions can be wrong..., first year, memories of Lily, shaking up sev's world view just a bit
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-09-09
Updated: 2014-09-09
Packaged: 2018-02-16 17:55:25
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 995
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2279214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/jeleania/pseuds/jeleania
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Severus Snape had fully expected to find the Girl Who Lived a copy of her prat of a father. Ego the size of the qudditch pitch, trouble-maker, spoiled - he'd have to harshly open the brat's eyes to the fact the world wasn't hers on a silver platter.</p><p>Then he got his first good look at her and realized an important fact he'd been ignoring.</p><p>Harriet Potter wasn't just the spawn of James.</p><p>She was Lily's daughter.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Candy Apple Red

**Author's Note:**

> just a little thing I wrote today.
> 
> enjoy.

* * *

 

 

 

He had been determined to hate the Girl Who Lived. Surely the child would be every bit like her father - arrogant, mischievous, an all-round brat. Probably had been spoiled rotten, fawned over and had her every whim fulfilled with due haste. Severus Snape would be the one who pop that inflated ego by not pandering to her self-absorbed world view, the other professors were all too giddy about having Potter's spawn grace the halls of Hogwarts to curb her wild behavior.

 

Then he'd gotten his first look at her at the Sorting Feast. She'd been tiny, a quiet wisp of a girl staring around in awed disbelief like she was in some fantastic dream she feared would vanish as soon as she blinked her eyes.

 

Lily's eyes - so very vividly green.

 

The potions master had pushed the thoughts aside. The little brat was a sneaky one, playing the part of the innocent child to lull everyone into a false sense of security. All too soon, she'd show her true colors of a attention-seeking troublemaker.

 

The next few days, he only caught glimpses of her or heard snatches of conversation with her as a topic. It seemed all that anyone could talk about, and it aggravated him. She was already sinking her claws into the minds of the school, wrapping people around her little finger to play with them like puppets to her tune.

 

Then came the day he'd been preparing for - the first potions class of the first year Gryffindors. With the brat in his domain, he could properly terrorize her and put her in her place. None of her pranking or playing the fool under his watch, he wouldn't allow it.

 

Leaving breakfast, he caught sight of the brat and felt his breath stutter at a familiar flash of red.

 

Candy apple red sparkling in her small earlobes.

 

_A candy apple red headband holding back scarlet hair was what first drew his eye to her._

_The crunch of the red candied apple under his teeth, her smile across from him as she bit into her own treat._

_With a kind laugh, she set a crown of woven leaves upon his head, the autumn foilage bold golds and rich scarlets like the candy apple red leaf caught in her hair._

_A finger decorated with candy apple red nail polish pointed out a line in their potions text, their heads bowed close as they studied._

_Her brilliant smile upon unwrapping his gift, the tiny but bright red stones in the jewelry glittering up at them._

_The red pencil case holding her quills she threw at him in their last argument after he foolishly called her **that**  word, his own hurt pride and anger keeping him from taking the cruel insults back._

_A glimpse of her at an Order meeting, the gentle swell of her belly carrying a new life covered in a candy apple red sweater._

Severus blinked free of the flood of memories in time to overhear one of the silly girls compliment her jewelry.

 

The Girl Who Lived to Remind Him of Lost Friends blushed lightly and ducked her head, fingers of one hand reaching up to reverently brush the said earrings.

 

"...they were my mum's." Her voice drifted to his ears. "They're all I have of her."

 

"Surely you have pictures and other things?" The Patil girl said in some confusion. "You said you live with your mom's sister, right?"

 

Petunia? Dumbledore put her with that shrew of a woman?! He remembered all too well her scorn of anything magical and how Lily had come crying to him after her sister had claimed she was a freak for being a witch. With how vicious that harpy had been, he highly doubted she had mellowed with age.

 

The girl shook her head, waves of black hair brushing her shoulder blades, her words proving him horribly right. "Aunt Petunia hated mum, called her a who- well, nothing nice." Her voice turned sad and wistful as she said, "I don't even know what Mum looked like."

 

Patil looked chagrined as the other females made comforting noises. The knot of Gryffindors made their way up the stairs and out of his earshot.

 

In a bit of a daze, Severus made his way down to the dungeons and set up his classroom for his first group of dunderheads. Didn't even know what Lily looked like? Been told her mother was a whore and Merlin knows what else? Stuck with Petunia and her sharp cruel tongue and her loathing of anything she considered abnormal for the past ten years?

 

It wasn't supposed to be that way.

 

He tried to hold onto his previous notions, but the ugly truths hinted in those few lines kept chipping away at his built up ideals. 

 

When the first year Gryffindor-Slytherin class rolled around, Severus put on his usual intimidating display. His class dealt with rather dangerous materials and situations, horse play could result in serious injury. The brats had to take things seriously in his classroom.

 

Calling attendance, he came upon her name down the list.

 

"Harriet Potter."

 

Green eyes blinked up at him, a mix of nerves and curiosity, kindness and wonder peering across the space into his black ones.

 

Lily's eyes in the face of an innocent shy young girl.

 

Lily's daughter.

 

Inwardly, Severus sighed and moved on with the lesson.

 

His view of the Girl Who Lived had been flipped on its side. He'd have to wait and see, learn more about the child, give her a chance rather than make assumptions based on a dead man.

 

She may have Potter's hair and name, but she was Lily's child as well.

 

In remembrance of the kind fiery girl who befriended a lonely outcast boy, Severus Snape would judge Harriet Potter on her own merit and let her show him (and the world) who she really was.

 

Wearing the candy apple red earrings he'd gifted to her mother a lifetime ago.

 

* * *

 

**Author's Note:**

> thanks for reading!
> 
> drop me a comment if you liked it/disliked it/noticed a grammatical error.


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